David Walliams on censorship, comedy taboos and his advice to Adele

Adele used to be David Walliams’ neighbour, “so I’d see quite a lot of her,” says the British comedian, actor and writer. “She came over for dinner and was saying how difficult it was to write her new album. I said to her: ‘The problem you’ve got is that you are against yourself, because you are trying to write Someone Like You every time you write a new song.’ To be creative, you’ve got to feel free.”

At this point, a message from his publicist pops up on our respective video screens: “PLEASE FINISH!!!” We realise we’re almost an hour into what was meant to be a half-hour chat.

“But I was in the middle of name-dropping!” Walliams jokingly protests.

Walliams is on a mission to instil a love of reading in children.Credit: Nic Walker

This is what it’s like talking with one of Britain’s favourite performers. Walliams – trim and handsome at 52, although he looks younger – avoids stock answers in favour of thoughtful responses. If a subject is contentious, he prefers to consider it from different angles, rejecting the performative moralising he hated in adults when he was small. He can easily spend 15 minutes discussing, say, the censorship of classic children’s books.

It’s 7.30am in London when Walliams and I meet over Zoom. He is in his kitchen, a light-filled space with marble benchtops and a warm white colour scheme. Barely 60 seconds later, Walliams’ head is obscured by the wriggling puppy he holds up to the camera: an adorable nine-week-old border terrier, Eric (named after one of his comedy idols, Eric Morecambe).

To describe Walliams as “effortlessly camp” misses the mark. He is intrinsically camp; a shy and sensitive boy who liked imitating Wonder Woman in the playground.

“It wasn’t for effect; I really loved the TV series and wanted to be her,” he writes in his excellent 2012 memoir, Camp David. “When I realised the other boys were laughing at me for this, instead of shying away from it, I embraced it so I could be in on the joke.”

In September, Walliams will return to Australia for a national tour: 10 shows for adults and five for children and families. Those attending the former will know Walliams from the TV hits Little Britain and Come Fly With Me, which he co-created, wrote and starred in with long-time comedy partner Matt Lucas. (The pair are working on a new project, the details of which are yet to be announced.) He’s had high-profile stints as a judge on Britain’s Got Talent and Australia’s Got Talent and his children’s books have sold an astonishing 56 million copies worldwide.

“When you see Ricky Gervais, Dave Chappelle or Chris Rock dealing with taboo stuff intelligently, it works.”

David Walliams

“There’s a connection between Brits and Australians,” Walliams says. “We’re in tune with our sense of humour, we watch each other’s TV shows and we like each other’s comedians, whereas America doesn’t look outwards very much.”

His show for adults, An Audience with David Walliams, is not traditional stand-up; instead, he will appear as some of his most beloved characters, share amusing behind-the-scenes anecdotes, take questions from attendees (rude queries are welcome) and play snippets of videos from his childhood and early career.

Lucas, whom he met at the National Youth Theatre in the early 1990s, videotaped much of their early work, including their first stage show and clips from Little Britain when it debuted as a radio series in 2000 before shifting to television in 2003, becoming a cultural phenomenon in the UK and abroad.

Among Walliams’ most memorable characters are prime ministerial aide Sebastian Love, who can barely conceal his attraction to his leader, and customer service representative Carol Beer, whose catchphrase “computer says no” earned its own Wikipedia entry.

“There’s a lot of stuff no one has seen before,” Walliams says, “and stuff about the process of coming up with our characters and our comic sensibilities.”

Since he was a boy, Walliams knew he wanted to be funny on stage; he just didn’t feel suited to stand-up. Seeing his favourite comedian, Barry Humphries, perform live in 1987 changed everything.

“I thought, ‘Oh, that’s what I want to do’,” he recalls. “He was a persona but in a stand-up kind of setting. It was so funny and I loved all the rudeness. He just didn’t hold back.”

Walliams (left) with comedy partner Matt Lucas. The pair co-created, wrote and starred in Little Britain and Come Fly with Me – and they have a new project on the go.Credit: BBC

Walliams appreciates that tastes and standards change; in 2020, he and Lucas apologised for some now-deleted scenes in Little Britain that contained blackface. At the same time, he’s wary of self-appointed comedy commissars.

“You end up with a list of things you can laugh at and things you can’t – but who’s in charge of that list?” he says. “When you see Ricky Gervais, Dave Chappelle or Chris Rock dealing with taboo stuff intelligently, it works. You can still get things wrong but often, the exciting stuff happens when you’re walking that tightrope.”

In Camp David, Walliams describes a father who struggled to bond with him and a mother who overcompensated, lavishing him with affection while battling what was then called “nervous tension”. Comedy was more than a distraction; whether watching a sitcom, listening to a comedy album or attending a live show, he instinctively analysed the structure and timing of jokes and the physicality of performers such as Rowan Atkinson.

He is especially frank about his experiences of depression, including attempts he made on his own life. “It would have been dishonest of me to write the book without talking about that,” he says. “But I don’t want that to be my whole identity. I’d rather make people happy.”

What makes Walliams happiest is his 11-year-old son, Alfred, whom he shares with ex-wife Lara Stone. “He’ll hold my hand and give me a kiss before he gets on the school coach,” he says. “There’ll come a time when he doesn’t want to do that, so I’m treasuring these moments.”

In 2008, Walliams published his first children’s book, The Boy in the Dress, partly inspired by his early experiences of his sister putting him in a mauve gown and his teachers casting him as female characters in school plays. Now a prolific children’s author, his books have been translated into 55 languages and many have been adapted for stage or screen.

TAKE 7: THE ANSWERS ACCORDING TO DAVID WALLIAMS

1. Worst habit? Eating Cadbury chocolate fingers late at night (Cadbury: if you are reading this, please send me some free ones).
2. Greatest fear? Someone finding out I’ve had extensive plastic surgery. 
3. The line that stayed with you? “Computer says no.” Someone says it to me every day or I see it as a headline in a newspaper. 
4. Biggest regret? When friendships or relationships end. 
5. Favourite book? The Twits by Roald Dahl. 
6. The artwork/song you wish was yours? Monty Python’s Life of Brian.
7. If you could time travel, where would you go? I would go back to ancient Rome. It seemed more fun. 

In the family-friendly David Walliams Book Show, he will share funny stories about his childhood, reveal the inspiration for his most famous characters, act out scenes from his books, read amusing fan letters aloud and give a prize to the child with the best question.

When asked about classic children’s books being sanitised to remove “problematic” sections, he’s conflicted.

“With Roald Dahl’s books, there are some changes where you think, ‘that’s probably sensible’, but in Matilda, the list of authors she likes gets changed,” he says, referring to Rudyard Kipling and Joseph Conrad being replaced by Jane Austen and John Steinbeck. “It felt intrusive and jarring. If we go around doing that, we don’t learn anything about the past. There’s a danger in thinking that 2024 is the year dot and we’ve got everything right now and nothing will ever change again.”

As Walliams well knows, children are the harshest critics: unlike adults who labour through critically acclaimed but dreary novels, kids simply toss a book aside the moment they lose interest.

His show has two purposes: to entertain families and instil or strengthen a love of reading.

“Children often feel misunderstood, isolated or secretive about things they want to do,” Walliams says. “One thing I always say when I talk to kids is: ‘We all feel different in some way or another and that is to be celebrated.’”

An Audience With David Walliams and The David Walliams Book Show will tour Australia from September 7. Tickets at tegdainty.com

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